Dr. Grant Scarborough

Mission Field

What’s yours? My patient knows hers. At her previous job, she ministered to people all the time. She viewed her job as a calling. She cared for them. She put her job aside at times and would get into deep conversations about life, purpose, and Christ. She asked tough questions and would not put up with shallow answers. She would call people out. Her job was her mission field, and she saw her share of fruit.

Friends have contacted her for years. They have shared with her personally how she helped them turn their lives around. They had come to know Jesus, gotten off of addictions, changed directions in life and took new career paths. They were grateful for knowing her.

I know I am in a mission field—but still I miss this. I lose mission. What about you? Do you see your job as a mission field? Do you look for ministry? Have lives been changed from your influence? Listen, we all have excuses, and I can hear yours already: “You do not know where I work.”  “It is not a Christian environment.”  “People will look at me differently.”

But Christ has you right where you are for a reason. Make a difference.

That’s what my patient would say, and she did. She made a difference right where she worked—at Platinum Strip Club. Yes, I said that correctly. Platinum. Strip. Club. She was the bartender. She ministered to men and women, some drunk, some not. But she changed the area around her. You can think whatever you want, but do not judge until you talk to her. She was on mission.

Let’s be honest. I do not have a category in which to place this encounter. I am simultaneously pleased and bewildered at my strip club bartender patient.

I feel much safer with my friend from last weekend. He tossed the cigarette aside as I walked up. His breath smelled of alcohol. I love this guy. Years back, he taught me how to love my wife and my kids in a Christ honoring way. His example back then inspired me to seek Christ early in the morning when others were still asleep. We hugged tight last weekend. He was one of those close talkers. I didn’t mind, though, he really wanted to hear about my ministry and share his.

“I will tell you my new ministry: it is to these people.” As he said this, he pulled his hand down his chin towards his neck. “The bearded people.” “Where do you find the bearded people?” I asked. “Mostly in bars.” He would buy them drinks, sit down and share the gospel with them. People would object—God could not love me—Do you know what I have done?  “Jesus’ love covers a multitude of sins. Jesus loves you.” He told the bearded ones.

Did I mention he is the president of a major company in the city. You would never think he, in suit and tie, would minister to the bearded ones. “Why them?” I asked.  “They need to know Jesus loves them. I am tired of telling people what they cannot do. I am ready to tell them simply that they are loved.” He was on mission.

These people honestly baffle me.

She was in the ticket booth, taking my ticket as I left the parking garage. She had two jobs—take the ticket and press the button to raise the bar. But she gave herself another job. As each person pulled away, she would lean out and say, “Have a blessed day.” Months went on and everyday she did all three jobs: ticket, button, “Have a blessed day.”

In the south, it is a pretty common phrase. Sometimes it means something spiritual. Sometimes it is just what momma said, but she intrigued me. She was African American and poor. I was in residency program, wearing a white jacket and a tie, preparing to be a doctor and she was blessing me—I think. So I asked her.

“You always say that phrase. Everyday. Why?”

“Because I know Jesus, and I want everyone that comes through these gates to be blessed by him.”

“Well I know Jesus too.” I responded. “And I receive your blessing.”

I had found a new friend. She was on mission. She would bless, I would smile and receive it. It was a great relationship, but she decided to take it to a new level.

“Every day I sit in this booth all day long and the only thing I can do is pray. So I stay in the booth and pray. I pray for friends, family, church and anything else I can think of. I would like to pray for you. Do you have any prayer requests?”

Are you the ticket booth lady or an angel? Yes! I cannot believe a ticket booth lady is praying for me, but our relationship was on a new level. I would drive out and give her my daily prayer request and she would pray. She wanted follow up. She wanted to know if God was answering prayers, so I would give her reports.

And then she wanted to take it to an even newer level.

“What can I pray for you today?”

“Pray for my family. They are driving home from Georgia today. In fact, they are driving right now.”

“Well, why wait? Let’s pray right now!”

“Ummmm, okay?”

About this time her right arm came out of the booth and landed on my head. Her left hand came out and went straight toward heaven. Her voice followed. I think her only wrong theology was that she thought God had a hearing disorder. She thought she had to talk really loud so God could hear and, for that matter, for a really long time.

As her prayer continued, and continued, I opened my right eye. If I opened my left eye, she would have seen me. I looked into my rear-view mirror to see cars lining up behind mine. I can only imagine what they were thinking. Is that Dr. Scarborough getting baptized in the Holy Spirit up there by the ticket booth lady? Then I started to pray. It was a short and simple prayer,“please stop praying, please stop praying, please stop praying.” Obviously, her prayer was louder than mine.

At some point she stopped praying, and I left a little quicker than normal.

Then she took it to an even newer level. She took to counseling. My prayer request this day was more complex.

“Pray for me, I do not know what I am going to do next year with my life?”

Then the ministering angel responded. “I don’t think God cares what you do in 1-2 years. I think God cares what you are going to do today. Are you going to be faithful? Are you going to serve him today? Sometimes people get so focused on 1-2 years that they forget that God has called them to live for him today. Where are you doing his work today? Listen, do not worry about 1-2 years, God will take care of that. You simply live for him today.”

I can honestly say, without a doubt, this was the best wisdom I received from my four years in Memphis.  And I had the best preachers and closest friends in my life in Memphis, but no advice compared to my ministering angel. She was on mission and she knew it.

Am I on mission? Do I see my place right now in life as where God has me to do his work? Praise the Lord for godly missionaries.

By: Dr. Grant Scarborough

Occasionally I get inspired to write, and this happens to be one of those days. I woke up early to vote for our next president. This is important. Four years of leadership that has the capability of changing our cities, neighborhoods, and even our very lives. Today was the day I made a difference. Standing in line with my diet coke can and granola bar in hand, I waited. One hour I waited. Then my time came, I thought. But they could not find my name. They found my wife’s name. I informed them that I lived with my wife. I even told them she was pregnant, I thought that gave me credibility. Still, no name. They called downtown, and I was not listed there either. I walked away dejected. I couldn’t even get an “I voted” sticker. I asked for the sticker and the sweet lady said, “Did you vote?” Well – you know – I just kept walking.  What a wasted hour, well, not completely wasted. For over an hour I talked with a lady who was trying to start an inner city medical clinic in a nearby community. Her eyes lit up as we talked, “I’ve heard about you,” she said. We exchanged phone numbers all the while talking with the next guy about his desire to start a once monthly dinner for the homeless. Then my two new Methodist friends used my wife’s favorite word, “providential.”  They smiled as they used this word while I stared in disbelief – or maybe old fashion confusion. Yes, by the time I reached the clinic I was a providentially dejected voter without even a sticker or an opportunity to change the world. I would even say that this is the curse of my mother, but she might read this one day.

All I can do now is pout and see patients. I am good at one of those and not so good at the other, and I will let you decide. My first patient was a middle aged man from rural South Carolina. He showed up with his CAT scan report in his hand. I read the results before I even saw him – a destructive invasive neoplastic lesion – obvious cancer that even a good “pouter” can interpret. The CAT scan was performed over a month ago (the words destructive and invasive came back to mind). Where have you been? Seemed like an obvious question. In unbelief I heard a story of rejection. He has been to four different hospitals that refused to help because he had no medical insurance, and of those four, two were even state hospitals. No one was willing to give him chemotherapy, radiation, or surgery. I yelled quietly, “What in the heck is wrong with this place?” This guy created in God’s image can die and no one cared. Breathe, exhale and keep going.

Patient number two: a kind inner city man with just your basic medical problems of high blood pressure, diabetes, and high cholesterol. He says everything is fine except…then he points to his head. “I don’t trust nobody doctor.” He tells a tale of sitting in his chair all night long and looking out his blinds every time he hears a noise.  He stands alone at the bus stop. He walks alone and turns around if anyone is behind him to make sure he is not being followed. He is big and intimidating but has become imprisoned mentally. His wife passed away over 20 years ago, and his son is in Iraq. “I don’t trust nobody doctor,” he repeats again and again. We prayed for his tormented paranoid mind that has imprisoned him. After prayer, the man gets ready to leave and then nervously speaks “Doctor…. one more thing…” – I don’t have time for ‘one more things’ – “There was an old lady out front who couldn’t pay her co-pay. What’s going to happen to her?”   I inform him that people have to pay a little bit to be seen. It teaches them responsibility or something. “Well she said she could pay in a couple of weeks, but I don’t know how she will be able to. Do you mind….. I mean …..Can I pay her co-pay?” I have never seen a borderline paranoid schizophrenic reach out and care for a stranger like this man. I walked back in a closed exam room and wept.

Is a president really going to change the world or will it be you and me and my paranoid friend? Has Christ not called us to this time and place to build His Kingdom and love His people?  Are we going to change the world in the ballot box and then go home and wait for it to happen?  We are his ambassadors, to build his kingdom, love a neighbor, serve the poor, and die to self.  That sounds great, but now what?

My nurse is having a yard sale, why don’t you come? In fact, she’s gathered a couple of friends to help, because economics tells you the more stuff at a yard sale the more you make.  And she wants to make lots of money. The yard sale is for Calvin – a quadriplegic, that comes to our clinic. He was recently hospitalized because Medicaid does not give him enough gauzes and supplies for all his wounds and his bed is not ideal for his thin quadriplegic body.  My nurse was thinking about writing Calvin’s name in for the presidential election, because if he became president he would have better supplies. Instead, she decided to raise the money through a yard sale. She is “wasting” one entire day so a new friend can have gauzes, wraps, and lotion to stay a few more days out of the hospital. Talk about changing the world! She has started with loving her new friend through a yard sale, more than I have done in a long time.

It is Election Day, and I did not vote; but if I could, I would vote for you, the reader. We need you to walk outside and love those around you for the sake of Christ. Go, serve, build, and die unto the glory of Christ. Have a yard sale, pay for someone who cannot afford his bill, care for someone dying of cancer.  Can you see the world beginning to change?

By: Dr. Grant Scarborough

“He showed me kindness. He taught me to be generous. I knew if I ever needed anything, he would be there for me.” What a great legacy. I hope people will say that about me one day. But his legacy did not start off that good. In fact, most people will remember the other legacy.

His diabetes was difficult to control. He was on insulin and poor so he could not always afford his insulin. He was also homeless, which made it difficult to keep insulin cool in the Georgia heat. He was not sure what to do, so he asked what seemed reasonable, “I live in a tent next to the river. Do you think I can keep it cool by keeping it in the river?” In all my training I never read a research study about the best way to keep insulin cool while living in a tent.

We came up with a better plan. Since his tent was nearby, he would come in weekly and we would keep his insulin cool for him. And that is exactly what he did. Over many short encounters, I learned about my friend.

He had been to prison. One note in his chart reported he was clean for 49 days. He was going to treatment five days a week. He lived in the tent city at the end of Second Avenue. “Oh, that tent city,” a light went off.

The homeless are outcasts. They, for whatever reason, mental illness, drugs, or poor decisions, are found fending for themselves. They have nowhere to return and no one to receive them.  But, even the homeless desire some sense of community. They have a sense of order and you are allowed to be a part of the community of outcasts. Everyone is welcome. Well, not everyone. One group is not welcome. They are thrown out of the homeless community and forced to live together in a smaller tent city. The one that caused a light to go off in my head when he mentioned it. The sex offenders. The homeless sex offenders are the outcasts of the outcasts. They are rejected by the homeless themselves.

To be honest, sex offender’s crimes are all different and they are all wrong. They deserve punishment for their crime, there are no excuses. Maybe they should never be let out of prison and maybe they should be further outcast. This story is so hard to write because the crime is so bad. Yet, I began to like my friend.

He was so polite – always saying thank you. He was very grateful for whatever help we offered. He was not rude. He was patient when it was busy. I would almost forget from which tent city he had come from as we talked in the exam room behind closed doors. We all experienced him at different times and ways, but we all liked him.

Then late one night, a text went out to many of the staff. It was a link to an article. The title was simple, “homeless man found dead in tent.” It was our friend. The reject of rejects had died alone in his tent.

After the article, there was a comment section. People were already commenting – some nice and some not so nice. And then someone posted his mugshot in the comment section which stated “sex offender,” the comments then became even more negative. If his legacy was not bad enough in his life, it became worse in his death – smeared in paper and ink.

We were all sad. We called the sheriff department to report the next of kin, but the phone number we had did not work. We discovered he would be cremated and buried in a pauper’s grave. Our staff wanted some closure. It happens often when one of our patients die that some might go to the funeral. But there was no funeral planned for him. I called my friend who works at a mission. He told me that they have funerals for the homeless from time to time. He encouraged us to have a service so our staff could have closure and he would put the word on the street so any homeless could come that wanted to have closure as well.

“But Grant, you will have to do the eulogy.”

“What’s a euology? Why me? I have never done that before.”

“You will be fine.”

So, I prepared for my Wednesday 1:00 service – even more than my presentation about MercyMed to a church that night. I was so nervous. I knew about him, but I did not know where he was spiritually.

How do I prepare for a service? What do I say? I polled some of the staff and they said similar words – kindness and grateful.

I settled on Psalm 23, I thought it might be a familiar passage and because of the line “He leads me beside still waters” It brought back to mind him putting insulin in the Chattahoochee River. “The Lord is My Shepherd, I lack nothing.” It starts with a Shepherd. I spoke of this Great Shepherd. How the shepherd went out after His sheep.

All throughout scripture Jesus goes after the lost sheep. It is the sick that need healing, not the healthy, the good book says. Jesus hung out with the sinners, tax collectors, prostitutes, and lepers so much he got a reputation. A bad reputation. He was talked about by the church leaders. The people with leprosy were themselves cast out. They were not allowed to be a part of the synagogue or even live in the city. They had to carry a bell around with them and whenever someone came near they had to ring their bell and yell “unclean!” They, too, were outcasts of outcasts because of a disease they had. This is much different from my friend who was an outcast of outcasts because of what he had done, but they, too, were unclean to the city.

The Great Shepherd makes unclean things clean. He, the clean holy one, reaches out and touches the unclean. As He touched the unclean, his holiness and perfection is not tainted. No, the unclean man is made new. The old has passed and the new has come. So, I preached that message. I told my new friends, the outcasts of outcasts, there is a great God that can make them a new creation. He makes unclean things clean. He can give them a new heart. And then we sang Amazing Grace, because we need amazing grace to clean this deep.

After singing, there was a time of sharing.

My nurse read, because she was afraid she would get too emotional. They had sat down when he picked up insulin recently. They sat and talked. He said, “everyday, I regret what I have done. It has ruined my life. There is never a day that goes by that I think about how I have ruined other people’s life and mine.”

“Do you know Jesus can forgive you?” my nurse asked.

“Yes.”

“Do you know that Jesus loves you?”

“Yes.”

Then my nurse closed her talk with simply saying, “I will miss him.”

Two other spoke – both from the tent city – both cried. Then, one said those words, those words of legacy from the tent city. The world knows the legacy of sexual offense, but among his people, they say, “he showed me kindness. He taught me to be generous. I knew if I ever needed anything, he would be there for me.”

The outcast of the outcasts ministering to one another. The gospel among the poorest of the poor. My friend knew Jesus, he knew he was forgiven and now he was ministering to others.

I like stories of redemption, I just do not like this one. Of all my stories I have written, this has been the most difficult to write. I have found I am uncomfortable with the depth of grace and the debts of man’s sin. Jesus’ grace extends to the worst – Jesus’ grace extends to the ugliest sin I can imagine. Sex offenders receiving grace? I am uncomfortable. I have four daughters. I have a shotgun.

MercyMed is not a homeless medical clinic. Most of our patients are the working poor. Even though our clinic is right next to the tent cities, the homeless rarely show up. They have huge trust issues. Because of their lack of trust, they hardly ever enter the clinic. I give this disclaimer, because today, a week after the funeral, late in the afternoon, a middle aged black man walked into the waiting room. We were finishing up our staff meeting. Someone was quick to say, “we are closed.” He swiftly said the name “Billy.”

He already knew Billy and saw him at the funeral. Billy walked over there first and then called me. It was a quick and brief conversation, but from the heart. “Thank you for doing that funeral for my friend. It meant a lot to me.” Then he quietly slipped out. I do not know if I will ever see him again, but I was overwhelmed by his kindness. He was so moved that he left his “comfortable” area of being an outcast to walk into the “unfamiliar” world we call normal to say thanks. I wonder if that was from the influence of my friend who passed away. I wonder if that was from the God who showed the utmost kindness. God’s kindness leads us to repentance.